boo radley

Aaaggh, that's bad news indeed. I was turned onto MB this year, and really like them for low cost and high performance. I s'pose I should try to scrounge and order a maxi-case. <sigh>

Have the *aluminum* SV. I'd be surprised if the steel one makes weight. It attaches in a slightly funky fashion, and required some minor modification (read: filing) to the MSH it comes with....It's nice, but not the difference I was expecting, and you still have to hit your loads. Very easy to get tempted into using a regular basepad, since *most* of the time, the mag seats. <grin>

That's an interesting anecdote, because...why wouldn't the rule VLUC quotes below (9.1.4) be in effect? Should it not have been a reshoot, regardless? I guess the more subtle question is: what constitutes the RO's ability to judge whether or not an accurate score can be determined? On the one hand, an edge hit that has to be studied (like your shoulder 'D' hit) would probably be remembered by the RO and/or person pasting the stage. On the proverbial other hand...who is to say how accurate the RO's memory is? But I don't see how it was ultimately scored */D. CRO finds RO's argument convincing, and completely disbelieves your argument: target scored */Mike CRO finds both arguments convincing, or neither convincing: reshoot CRO finds your argument convincing, and totally disbelieves RO: target scored */D. Like Redmist, I've learned my lesson about never stopping. But if I'd previously been stopped a couple times, mid-stage by an RO, when they saw a pasted target...it would be that much harder to keep shooting. I also think there's a lot of misunderstanding around this rule -- I've frequently heard "best two...", and known shooters who think the "blow the paster off" trick, if target is close enough, is legit.

Boz1911 & all, so I'm still confused. When do you -- as an RO -- stop the shooter, because you (and/or the shooter?) notice an unpasted target, and when do you say nothing, and let the shooter continue shooting the stage? Thx

Hmm....at a big Level III match this summer, I was shooting a stage and in the middle of the next array, saw a clearly unpasted target. I stopped myself (in retrospect, big no-no), dismounted the pistol and pointed the target out the RO. He said nothing, and after a very awkward pause, I said, "well, guess I better keep shooting?", and finished the stage in a jumble, with a couple mikes, as it was a complex stage, and I was totally lost at that point. It was a bad stage among many, so I'm not bitter, but I'm thinking the RO in my case did the *right* thing, and in the examples above, the wrong thing? But unpasted targets are common enough, I hope the rulings are consistent.

Which is directly related to China's massive demand for metals, and other base commodities, where it gets shared with us in ways unimaginable. Instead of buying Montana Gold, I'm just going to start melting down WalMart crap. Oh, the irony....

<grin> I think the challenges posed by creating an internet voting solution (to say nothing of expense) make the current pen-and-paper method downright idyllic. If I distance myself from brianenos.com/forums, the 35-40% voting rate doesn't seem unexpected. And, regardless: if only the most motivated respond....why is that bad? At least direction is in the hands of those who most care.

The good is, there are a *lot* of folks out there who will buy something if they can use a credit-card, but might not otherwise. But the bad simply isn't worth it to me, anymore. The fees are outrageous, even on non credit-card funded balances. And if you get a charge-back, maybe *months* after you sold something, you're SOL. Imagine this happy story: You sell John Doe a 1911 pistol for $1000, and he pays using PayPal and his credit card. You tell him not to put "gun" or anything in the description. You get the funds, and spend it, and life is good. Two *months* later, he gets in a financial jam, or maybe hates the gun, or either way is a jerk, and files a charge-back with his credit-card company. Wham -- PayPal freezes your account, and pulls $1000 from your bank-account on file. Since you unwisely linked your checking account to PayPal, and don't keep a large balance, now checks you wrote on your $1000 balance start bouncing. Etc. <grin> And PayPal's not your friend, anyway, in a chargeback situation. Imagine how happy they'll be when they find out you collected funds for a firearm.

Well...a couple issues were going on. I pulled the tool-head last night, to look up into the die, and noticed the depriming pin was way off center, and bent. Not only was I depriming, I was also enlarging the flash hole, or poking another one. No wonder the press was, uh, "sticky". Fortunately, I had another pin. Second, while the die was scratched, I wrapped some 600grit paper around a ball point pen, and twirled for a while. Life is now good. I think -- scratches are from dirty media and brass. I've been picking up a lot of really dirty brass lately, from an outdoor range and practice, and possibly the silicon spray helps suspend the grit, too... And the difficult press operation was from the bent resizing pin. It's time to do a major clean, anyway. Thx

I've flown to 3 matches with guns and ammo -- each time with 300 rounds of .40 S&W in plastic cases. Only once -- with SouthWest -- did I have a bit of an issue. The counter agents asked me to wait around for a few minutes, in case TSA had an questions (seems to be SOP ). I did so, and a few minutes later a TSA guy came out and said they were "trying to figure out how much ammo I had," having not seen so much in a bag before. "And is it factory ammo??" A few minutes later, they waved me along, but I don't think I'm going to press the limit in the future. I do believe it's a good idea to keep a couple factory cardboard ammo boxes around, and use those for flying instead of MTM cases. I'm honestly surprised, in a way, airlines let you fly with 11lbs, in fact. Pleased, but surprised.

Good info here. I do run my cases through a separator but I haven't changed my media in a LONG time. Luca -- good point about the sizing dies, but then I'd expect the damage only on the bottom of the sizing die -- not inside it. I still think the issue is related to grit and/or silicone spray. Press is in my home office, and not subject to the elements beyond a sometimes cold, howling wind from my wife <grin>. I'll take some pictures later. This is getting expensive, 'cause once the dies gets scratched like this, they don't appear to heal.

I don't know what's going on. About two months ago, towards the end of loading about 1k of .40's, my 650 got tough to operate, and I traced it to the resizing/depriming die (station 1). The carbide ring was a bit scratched up, and indeed -- my brass was coming out of this die striped with thin scratches along the length. I'm using Lee dies. Sent the die off, which Lee replaced (thx!), and in the meantime loaded up .45acp, again with Lee dies, and again with the same problem. I can take pictures, but there is a series of scratches in the carbide ring which really make it tough to operated the press. When I lower the handle, it sometimes takes major "ooomph" to yank the case out of the die. In the meantime, I had ordered a single Dillon sizing die in .40, and now that, too, is starting to get scratched up. I can't imagine what is going on....I tumble my brass and think it's more or less clean? The other common denominator is that I've gone to using a can of silicon spray exclusively for a case lube, because it's cheap and seems to work....Could this be causing an issue? Somehow grit is getting suspended in the silicon from the caseloader? But then why wouldn't this happen with waxy One-Shot, too? So odd.

Don't let Flex see that wish-list. <grin> I've bought (and sold) an embarrassing amount of Glock accessories for the Glocks I have/had, and a couple things IMO, only: Shooters Connection/Dawson/CPWSA are forum sponsors, so all things being equal.... The THE magwell is crude in comparison to either the Dawson magwell or SJC magwell. What's the difference in cost? A box of factory ammo?? I had bad luck with the THE full-length tungsten guide rod, probably the only one to buy, and ISMI springs. The rod developed some scoring issues, and the square-edged profile of the ISMI recoil spring coil would catch. Drove me crazy for months until I went with the Wolff spring. I'm not sure about the ISMI springs, but if you buy a Wolff reduced power recoil spring, it will also come with a reduced power striker spring (which you'll come to hate, unless you lighten your striker).

What would be the anticipated attendance of a 'combined' Nationals? Would it really be that large? I mean, there are a lot of cross-over shooters who shoot SS at the SS Nationals, and Production at those Nationals, but if all these matches were *concurrent*.....Why would it be so much bigger than, say, Area6?

1) Start fresh in a different Division and... 2) Shoot Production. The same hit factor in Production seems to generate a higher percentage than in Limited, or L-10. 3) Try to shoot one (or more) of those 4-classifier matches. This removes the <dramatic organ music> "It's the CLASSIFIER" </dramatic organ music> aspect of local matches, since EVERY stage is a Classifier, and if you can't get at least one or two A-class scores out of 4 stages, you probably shouldn't move up. 4) If you know what the classifier is going to be for a match, try to set it up for dry-fire (or live-fire, if you're lucky enough to have the resources). I didn't get obsessed, but if I could hit a par-time that would give me all A's, somewhere between 75%-80%, I was relaxed and confident. Figure match adrenaline will make you faster, but also add the 'C-hit.' I didn't set out to grandbag, but the above strategy worked for me. It's a victory to get out of that awful "B-Class is the Bermuda Triangle!", mindset, but I've also had a terrible year otherwise, in matches. <shrug> The lesson doesn't escape me.

Congrats to you, and the other Forum members who did well! Looks like you had a pretty tight battle with Seeklander and Strader. So...I'm puzzled and don't know much about international events, but if there are over NINE HUNDRED shooters at this event...where are all of the US shooters, specifically those sponsored super-GM's? Not an "Us vs Them" thing, but I'm thinking more along the lines of product exposure and what has to be a desire to shoot against the world's best. Where's Sevigny to shoot agains Tyc? The Army team? Max and Chris to challenge Eric? If the European championship is pulling in close to 1000 shooters from countries who make New Jersey's gun laws look like Sadr City's, and our USPSA Nationals is getting a couple hundred, I think something is "off."

"Michael Vick sent me a BIG-ass puppy, for real!" eta, sorry...Dunno, Jake. It's not clear from the image, if the human is on offense, or defense, but either way he seems prepared and without fear.

That's a great website and looks like an *incredible* match...How many competitors?

Good post, Chris...but for me, the hard part is psychological. I was joking with another shooter last night -- I might order another magwell and mag extensions for my G35 to shoot Limited. No big deal, except this would be the FIFTH magwell I've bought (having sold the previous ones) and THIRD time I've bought Dawson +4's, only to sell 'em on the forum. It's amusing, but not. The thing is, I've yet to have a good, confident match with my STI, or hell, even a single-stack. The Glock just feels comfortable, presumably because I've shot ~25k through it, so there's always a feeling of: "%*($*( -- I wish I had my Glock," when things go south with the STI. I need to really grind out some rounds through it, but...why? Because I've bought one, and have one? That's a hell of a reason. Shoot a bunch through a Glock only if you want to really diminish the joy of any other pistol purchase. They jade you fast, and you kinda become not really happy with....anything.

I think it depends on how much $ you're talking about, IMO, and with whom you're dealing. I've never had a problem on Enos, and I've bought and sold the odd item, and sent/received cash, checks, money orders.... But in general, pretty much anything can be forged. I will say that a requirement to send a USPS Money Order only, is an extreme turn-off -- I have to want something pretty badly to take time out of my business day and stand in line in the Post Office.

I'm the exact opposite -- I'm constantly rechecking the zero on my pistols after matches...Convinced the sights have been bumped or somehow moved, which would've caused all those extra shots on steel. Yet when I check 'em in an indoor range, they're dead-on. Odd as hell.

Hey, thanks all! I found myself getting really concerned with classifiers and 'getting out of B', etc., and I'm not sure that's the best place to spend mental energy.

Fantastic! Great job, Dave!

Pleasantly surprised to get a classification update in the mail from USPSA, and see I've moved into Production "A" class. Ha - spent a lot of money on a fancy Limited gun, and ended up mostly shooting Prod this summer, with a beater Glock 35. Unfortunately, my classifiers have been a lot better than my match performances. It's clear to me that a moderate degree of effort with dry-fire goes a LONG way to turning in good classifiers. I need to translate the improvement to the rest of my game.

Tonight, in my mailbox, was the small tub of SlideGlide "1". Thx, Brian! I'll give it a try -- I kinda prefer a greasier lube than an oil, and if it stays put and doesn't spray my clothes, and softens the recoil a tad, I'll be delighted. But I wonder, really -- what *doesn't* work?